Academy In Annapolis

From the oval-shaped windows of an airplane, Maryland looked enough like Belize that for a moment, teenagers Andrea and Javier Bosch forgot about the lush landscape and glittering beaches of their Central American homeland. "As we arrived it was like `Wow,'" Javier Bosch said. "It's very green here, and coming from Belize, that's what we are used to." Beginning today, however, the 19-year-old twins will realize how different their lives will be at their home for the next four years: the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis.

In the ivory towers of academia, free thought is a virtue and authority exists to be questioned. But at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, authority is to be revered and obeyed. For the 221 uniformed members of the teaching faculty, that's not a problem. They readily salute their commanders and heed orders. For the 313 civilian professors, who teach everything from English literature to electrical engineering and often come from a culture that favors the free exchange of views, it can be a source of tension.

Cheating. Lying. Stonewalling.They're not the words that traditionally come to mind when talk turns to the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis.It is supposed to be a school of cap-tossing pride and achievement, not a place of dishonor, where a stolen electrical engineering exam could move swiftly through the decks of Bancroft Hall.The largest cheating scandal in the school's 149-year history -- with 133 senior midshipmen implicated -- has caused many to wonder how the academy got off track.Look no further than two disparate emblems of recent history: Timothy Leary and Hyman Rickover.

On the same day last spring, Diane M. Zamora and her boyfriend, David C. Graham, learned that their enviable high school records had won them appointment to the nation's prestigious military academies -- Zamora to the Naval Academy in Annapolis, Graham to the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colo.The 18-year-old Texans announced their engagement to be married after graduation, setting the date for Aug. 13, 2000. But the clean-cut couple carried to their new campuses a terrible secret.

Colorado Springs, Colo.-- --From the moment new cadets arrive at the U.S. Air Force Academy, the message is made abundantly clear. They attend classes in small groups, separated by gender, and learn the meaning of terms like "bystander effect," "non-stranger assault" and "situational awareness." They see video screenings of Frank: The Undetected Rapist. Fliers all over the sprawling, space-age campus bear the numbers 333-SARC, a sexual assault hot line on which cadets can call a trained specialist at any hour to ask questions, seek advice or report sex crimes.

With a flick of his wrist, a U.S. Naval Academy baseball player from Orlando, Fla., tossed an upperclassman's hat atop the Herndon Monument on Monday, leading his 2016 classmates to launch into cheers of "Plebes no more!" amid roars from onlookers. "I was considering jumping and making it a little more dramatic," said Patrick Lien - who is a catcher, not pitcher, on the Navy team, "but I didn't want to fall and make a scene. " The Herndon climb was itself a scene: hundreds of plebes, or freshmen, charged a slickened, 21-foot tall granite obelisk at the service academy in Annapolis.

Veterans Day observances are set to take place tomorrow at war memorials and veterans cemeteries throughout the state. Originally called Armistice Day and celebrated to mark the end of World War I in 1918, Veterans Day honors veterans who fought and are fighting for freedom, said the office of Maryland Department of Veterans Affairs. In keeping with the traditional ceremony, most of tomorrow's events will begin at 11 a.m., the hour on Nov. 11, 1918, that hostilities between the Allied forces and Germany ended.

When movie tough guy Robert Mitchum died July 2, news stories announcing his death listed his birthplace as Bridgeport, Conn.However, according to a 1948 story in The Sun, Mitchum, the son of a railroader, was born in the Cecil County town of Rising Sun:"Hollywood, Sept 1 (AP) -- Robert Mitchum, screen player, and two actresses left jail under $1,000 bond each today after their arrest earlier in a narcotic raid on a Laurel canyon home."Mitchum along with actress Lila Leeds, 20; dancer Vickie Evans, 25, and Robert Ford, a real estate man, were booked on suspicion of violating state and Federal narcotics laws after police said they broke in on a marijuana smoking party in the girls' home.

Dr. Barry S. Gold, a Baltimore internist and medical director of Maryland State Medicare, was elected to a fellowship in the American College of Physicians.*Polgeorge R. Mijares of Millersville recently received an appointment to the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis.*Fred Weaver was presented with a governor's citation for his volunteer work at Owen Brown Middle School in Columbia.*Bronwen Lara Wickkiser, the daughter of the Rev. Bruce and Mrs. Mary Jane Wickkiser of Baltimore, has been elected to the Phi Beta Kappa national honor society at Oberlin College in Ohio.

Three ensigns whose parents reside in Howard County recently graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis and were commissioned to their current ranks.Matthew J. Harrison is the son of H. Arden and Patricia Harrison of Columbia. Harrison, a 1987 graduate of Wilde Lake High School, will report for duty at Surface Warfare Officers School, Newport, R.I.Krista L. Lamoreaux is the daughter of Glen and Beverly Salas of Highland. She will report for duty at Naval Air Station, Pensacola, Fla. for Pilot Training Flight School.